I work in Corporate Woods so there are charging stations all over this place. In our building parking lot alone there are six chargers. I've only seen one car use it in the last 6 months and I'm guessing that was someone passing through since I've never seen them here before or since.

So I think using the charging station at work will be a no brainer and trouble-free for years. This is also in JoCo, known for trucks and SUV's, I see more EV's in the Northland than I do down here. So I don't think I'll have much competition for the charging stations around here for years, if not decades.

I definitely would be charging at work every day, but likely not full charging. I'd probably just do an hour charge.

To answer the question of why I'm considering this. We are a two car family, we use my wife's car for all our family drives. My car literally is 99% just commuting to work and the other 1% is running 15 mile or less errands here and there on the weekends or evenings. So I felt an EV would be a really good fit.

While the KCP&L charging is free I'd save quite a bit of money, but I do have concerns about what the cost will be next year. I've heard since it is KCP&L they will bill me on my electric bill. I don't know if they will charge more or less than my home rate. Our rates aren't as cheap as some of these other high EV states, my electric bill runs around .135 per kwh.

Assuming I charge roughly 30 kwh per day that is $4.05 a day. On the weekends I probably would only need to charge Friday night and be good to still make it to work Monday. That would put my electric cost at $20.25 per week. Right now I spend about $28 per week on gas for my car. So only about an $8/week savings on "fuel" between the two vehicles.

I see people talking about saving thousands on gas, but they must drive some very low mpg vehicles to do that. I will save about $100 per year in oil changes. And this would also act as a hedge against rising fuel costs. I expect we won't see $3 gas before 2018, but inevitably gas prices will go up.

I might consider a 2016 model as mentioned above, but then we'd be talking about a purchase likely in 2018 as there don't seem to be many used models newer than 2015 right now, and the 2015's aren't all that plentiful. Plus, I'm trying to keep the purchase price to around $12K or less. If a used 2016 were available today I'd be surprised if I could nab it for under $15K.

Consider a lease of a 2016 SV or SL with 30 kWh battery. In 3 years, the landscape will have changed and then you can decide whether it's worth the residual or turn it in and see what else is our there.

MobileEV wrote:Consider a lease of a 2016 SV or SL with 30 kWh battery. In 3 years, the landscape will have changed and then you can decide whether it's worth the residual or turn it in and see what else is our there.

Hint: Look at dealers outside of our area.

Karl

The problem with leasing is my total cash outlay over 3 years will bust through my $12K budget. Plus I then have to deal with end of lease unknowns such as mileage and damage.

I did a rough calculation assuming an SV model with sales tax rolled into the monthly lease coming out to around $435/mo with no down payment. This obviously could be affected by the willingness of a dealer to negotiate the sales price. If one would take about $3K off the MSRP then I'd be closer to $350/mo which gets me close to my $12K cap. But then I still have the end of lease unknowns. I'll also have to deal with higher property taxes.

The lease I'm looking at is $322 per month for 36 months, so $11,592 total payments. Yes, I will need to watch mileage and condition, but I'm guessing Nissan will be making attractive buyout offers as they have in the past.

MobileEV wrote:The lease I'm looking at is $322 per month for 36 months, so $11,592 total payments. Yes, I will need to watch mileage and condition, but I'm guessing Nissan will be making attractive buyout offers as they have in the past.

Karl

Is that a 15K miles per year lease or 10K per year and does the lease rate include sales tax?

I ran some more numbers, found out that Nissan charges $10/mo extra to go from a 12K to 15K lease and if I prepay the miles it is $0.10/mi for overages.

So $332/mo, plus $900 to get to 18K miles per year and $395 for disposition fee gets me a total cash outlay $13,247. Property tax will be about $500 higher per year over used/or current car, but I should get most of that back through fuel savings.

Basically leasing doesn't save me any actual money. The best deal is still a used Leaf if I could just build my confidence in what I'll get out of a three year old used battery. If I had my previous job it would be a no brainer, I was driving half the miles a day that I drive now.

I still may chat with a couple dealers to see what leasing deals look like, but I have a feeling I won't get any offers better than what is listed above.

I am pretty sure you could make this work, with a post 4/2013 battery. Age is pretty much irrelevant, unless its been beat to crap in a hot place. BUT, you will need to charge at work. Period. If these is any question about that being possible, then be wary......